The Jazz have officially acquired the Idaho Stampede, becoming the eighth NBA team to fully own and operate their own D-League franchise, the team announced. The Stampede have also signed a one-year contract extension with the downtown arena and will continue to play in Boise, Idaho for the 2015/16 season. “Our purchase of an NBA D-League team reflects the value we place on having an exclusive affiliate for player development and building the scope of our basketball operations to support the Jazz,” said Jazz president Randy Rigby. “It is a tremendous commitment from the Miller family to make this acquisition that will contribute to our pursuit of becoming a championship-caliber team.” Idaho was already Utah’s affiliate, but now the Jazz will control both the basketball operations and business sides of the D-League franchise.

Here’s more from Utah:

Greg Miller, the former CEO of the Miller Management Corporation that controls the Jazz, believes that Utah has a bright future, Mike Sorensen of The Deseret News writes. Miller ended his seven-year tenure as CEO earlier this month. “Everywhere I go people want to talk about the Jazz and I tell them we are in a period where when we look back on it, we’ll say that this was the beginning of a very special era,’’ Miller said.

Bojan Dubljevic, whose rights are owned by the Timberwolves, will be with Valencia of the Euroleague for at least the next two seasons without the possibility of arranging a buyout, Darren Wolfson of 1500 ESPN Twin Cities reports (Twitter link). The forward was selected by Minnesota with the No. 59 overall pick in the 2013 NBA draft.

Utah had an option in its contract with the Stampede, giving the Jazz the ability to buy the D-League team, Jeff Zillgitt of USA Today tweets. Utah was interested in purchasing Idaho at start of this season, Zillgitt adds.